Why is it much better to do the residencies separately to be dual certified?
Also, why do most of your friends hate their lives in the triple/dual certified programs? Is it harder? Not time for a life? Whats the issue?
For one, you're not limited to the small handful of programs that have the dual-board programs. You get to spend 3 years learning to be a good medicine doc, then 3 years learning to be a good psychiatrist. If in the middle you decide you just want to do medicine, you have that option. There are probably more good programs that have open pgy2 positions on any given year than there are good programs that offer dual board programs. And with three concentrated years of psychiatry, you might actually have a chance to learn to do some therapy, whereas you probably won't have that luxury in a 5 year dual board program. Something has to give, and therapy is the first thing to go.
My friends seem miserable because they are orphans, they're always behind everyone else, they have people pulling at them from all sides, and they're serving two program directors who at times have different agendas. Medicine residencies are physically exhausting, but less emotionally so. Psychiatric residencies are emotionally exhausting, but less physically so. Dual boards could either get the best or worst of both worlds, but I find that most of them just feel exhausted both ways.
As I've said on other threads (and I unfortunately have to clarify that I'm trying to be funny rather than mean):
If you want to be a psychiatrist who specializes in *insert whatever ridiculous obscure subject medical students come up with here*, be a psychiatrist and then find people who will let you do that work as a psychiatrist. Becoming a medical expert in autoimmune scrotal disease will not help you that much in being a psychiatrist treating people with autoimmune scrotal disease who become psychotic. Maybe doing an away rotation at Ball State would make sense, but not a whole other residency.
If you want to be an internist or a family med doc who specializes in primary care in the SMI population, recognizing that you doing this work will be subject to organizations understanding the value you offer rather than reimbursement you can receive, then the dual programs are reasonable. And bless your bleeding heart.
If you're thinking triple board, you should probably just let someone beat the **** out of you with a baseball bat once a month for five years and then do psychiatry residency and child fellowship. That would be less painful than a triple board residency, and might even be more useful. (I'm really tired of seeing one of my best friends crying all the time, and we're pgy4s. It's not getting better for her.)
If you want to open up some "holistic care wellness center" somewhere on the West Coast where people can get their "medical and psychiatric care and yoga and lemongrass tea lattes all in one convenient location," you should just let someone beat the **** out of you with a baseball bat once a month for five years, period. Don't bother with any of the residencies.
Hope that helps!
